


there's a lot of walls need tearing down (together we could take them down one by one)

by janie_tangerine



Category: Iron Fist (TV)
Genre: Bromance, Clothes Shopping, Danny Rand Is a Gift, Gen, Hugs, I Don't Even Know, I suppose, Male Friendship, Platonic Cuddling, Post-Season/Series 02, Spoilers, Tumblr Prompt, ironfistweek, shou lao has complicated tastes I suppose
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-28
Updated: 2018-10-28
Packaged: 2019-08-08 23:22:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,913
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16438793
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/janie_tangerine/pseuds/janie_tangerine
Summary: In which Ward and Danny go on their road trip, find Orson Randall's guns and learn a few things about Shou Lao (maybe), there's healthy discussions of feelings and Ward decides that maybe leaving New York is the best idea he's ever had.





	there's a lot of walls need tearing down (together we could take them down one by one)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Sholio](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sholio/gifts).



> AAAAND I'M LATE FOR IFWEEK DAY FOUR, gen relationships, but have a lovely prompt from tumblr user laylainalaska, _something from Danny and Ward's adventures in Asia, please? I love hurt/comfort, but I'm also just fine with something funny or angsty or basically anything. I love Ironwing, so Colleen is welcome to show up too!_ Colleen IS SORT OF IN IT so I hope it suffices but this basically these two bromancing all over. THANKS FOR GIVING ME A CHANCE TO WRITE THE THING I WANTED SINCE I SAW THE FINALE. ;) 
> 
> Also: they don't belong to me, the show isn't mine, the title is from Springsteen as usual and now I'll saunter back downwards, thank you very much. /o\

“… Did I really leave without even a change of clothes?” Ward asks some half hour after the plane takes off — thirty minutes that he spent thinking about pretty much nothing and ignoring the phone that he forgot to turn off.

There are no texts on it. Of course there aren’t.

“As if we can’t buy one when we land in Hong Kong,” Danny says, sounding _amused_. “Come on, I doubt it’s the biggest problem on your hands right now.”

“Fine,” he admits, “I’m deflecting.”

“From what?”

“… Everything?” He’s not sure he’s ready to spill it all out _now_ , even if having left New York behind his shoulders is already making him feel tangentially better than before.

Danny sends him a nonplussed look from the other side of the aisle, then stands up, stretching his back. “I’m going to the bathroom,” he says, “but if you want to talk it’s a while until Hong Kong.”

“There’s no need —”

“If you want to talk about _anything_ , we have all the time in the world.” He pats Ward’s shoulder and disappears into the jet’s bathroom, sending him an _understanding_ stare, and Ward just —

On one side, it’s such a _Danny_ thing, of course he wants to talk. And of course he wants to talk when _he_ probably needs it more than Ward does, with having lost the Fist _and_ whatever happened with Colleen and his former _brother_ from another dimension leaving him almost crippled with _Joy_ ’s help out of anyone.

Instead he’s asking _him_ if he wants to talk.

Jesus H. Christ.

He takes off his jacket, throws it on the side, lies back on the sofa, and he tries to not think about how much he was an obstacle in Danny’s way just when he showed up, and —

He stands up, shakes his head and heads for the minibar, takes a root beer out of it — he’s not drinking if he can help it — and drains it as Danny gets out of the bathroom, a minute after Ward hears it flush.

“Ward,” Danny says the moment their eyes meet.

“… Yes?”

“You look like _shit_.”

Ward has to laugh — yeah, well, he’s fairly sure he _does_. “What’s new under the sun?”

Danny _stares_ at him, as if he’s doing the math for _something_. Ward has no idea what it is, but — Danny shakes his head almost fondly, then takes a step back, shrugs and opens his arms.

 _What_ —

“No,” Ward says at once.

Danny just smiles slightly wider. “Ward, honestly, no one else is here, no one is seeing us, you don’t have to prove anything to anyone, how about we just cut the bullshit here?”

“Are you _swearing_?”

“Not the point and you’re deflecting,” Danny grins, and fine, he’s right, Ward’s _absolutely_ deflecting, and —

He’s right. Who is even going to _see_ them now?

He takes a step forward. “This stays on the plane,” he says.

“Sure it does,” Danny goes on. He doesn’t move an inch. Ward takes a step forward and a moment later Danny’s holding on to him like it’s the most natural thing they could do, and Ward tentatively hugs him back before realizing that Danny’s _warmer_ than he is and that he can actually relax, and the moment he does and closes his eyes for a moment he decides that it wasn’t such a bad idea. Danny sits down on the nearest small sofa and Ward doesn’t protest when he drags the both of them down so that Ward’s back is against the cushions and Danny is on the outer side of it. At least it’s warm, and the leather’s comfortable, and Danny’s arm around his waist is _hot_ — Ward is honestly wondering if he doesn’t have some of that chi still left in him because no one runs that hot as a general thing, but who even cares? It’s nice, and it’s comfortable, and he can’t remember the last thing he actually hugged someone who wasn’t Joy or that he was not having sex with or that wasn’t doing that for, well, _secondary_ reasons.

“You sure that fist is completely gone?” Ward asks.

“What?”

“You’re a _furnace_.”

“Is that a problem?”

“Hell no,” Ward shakes his head. “It’s just _weird_ , you might wanna look into it.”

“Hm, I might. That’s what we’re going to do anyway. Any better?”

“Maybe,” he admits, snuggling closer. He can feel Danny snorting under his breath.

He’s _not_ going to dignify that with a comment.

——

They get to Hong Kong after spending the rest of the flight like _that_ , and Ward is _really_ grateful that Danny doesn’t push for _talking_ about things. They land, he insists to find accommodations and some damned clothes before doing anything because like hell he’s going around in hot-humid weather with a damned jacket and tie, and since they’re both wide awake they spend an afternoon trying to track down from where in Hong Kong did that shipment that arrived at Hancock 212 leave from. Ward tries using his corporate business credentials but that doesn’t work, Danny spends a few hours attached to the internet swearing under his breath until he takes his phone, calls some _Jessica_ person in New York, asks her if she can help him crack _something_ and some ten minutes later he raises a fist in the air and says something about the woman being a lifesaver.

“Who was that?”

“This PI I know,” Danny says. “A very good one, for that matter. And she might have just saved our collective asses.”

“How?”

“Well, I did try to trace back _where_ did that shipment leave from, but I couldn’t bypass the firewall because it was some private company providing the service. _She_ could, though.”

“And?”

“It left from one specific hangar in the port,” Danny says, “but it’s, like, a _privately_ owned hangar.”

“So what?”

“So tonight maybe we should go check. If you want to come, of course —”

“I _can_ use a gun,” Ward mutters. “You sure?”

Danny looks fondly at the katana he brought with. “Oh, I _can_ take care of myself.”

Right. _Colleen’_ s katana.

Ward has a clue that if she had known she’d have never let him leave, but never mind _that_.

“Fine,” he says, “let’s go catch some bad guys.”

Danny holds out a fist to him. He rolls his eyes, makes one himself and bumps it with his own, and fine, it’s _cute_ , but he wouldn’t do that with anyone else.

Hell, _no_.

——

Danny doesn’t eventually need Ward’s gun — the goons around the hangar are fairly easy to get rid of and none of them talks, of course. They break into it — it has a _lot_ of items stored in it. Mostly chests that look very much locked.

One of the spaces is just large enough for that damned container with the body in it.

“Well,” Danny says, “this is the right place.”

“What are we looking for?”

“Anything that tells us who exactly owns this place, because the name was definitely fake.”

Ward nods and starts going through the boxes, seeing if he can find a receipt or invoice or _something_ , until he finds one nestled in between two that are _definitely_ full of weed.

“Hey,” he says, “does the name Orson Randall mean anything to you?”

Danny stops at once from his rummaging on the other side of the hangar. “What did you say?”

“Orson Randall.”

“Shit,” Danny says, “it _is_ familiar, but _— wait_ ,” he groans, and turns on himself, reaching for a smaller box on a shelf on top of him.

“What’s going on?” Ward asks, coming closer.

“I don’t know,” Danny says, “but — whatever’s inside here — never mind. We need to go. Bring that thing.”

“As the boss says,” Ward snorts, and follows him out of the hangar and into the car they left outside the port. He drives while Danny clutches the box to his chest — it’s actually a locked chest, so they can’t open it for now, but maybe it’s better like this.

Ward shakes his head and turns on the radio, tuning out some local pop music that sounds exactly like everything he generally doesn’t like listening, and drives back to their room — more than a room, it’s a hotel with small single houses in rows and each of them has a backyard, so at least it’s comfortable.

——

“So,” he says when they’re back, “what’s in the box?”

“Hilarious,” Danny says, but he _is_ laughing, a bit. “And _I don’t know_ , but — whatever’s in here, it has — a weird aura.”

“ _A weird aura_.”

“I felt like it was calling to me,” Danny shrugs. “Do you have a Swiss knife or something?”

“It’s your luck I bought one,” Ward says, handing it over. Danny opens it until he finds the actual knife, starts fiddling with the lock until he actually breaks it and the chest opens.

Ward had expected some weird dragon-like thing or maybe another piece of corps or _whatever_ , not two guns.

“The hell,” he says. “They’re nice guns, though.”

“They’re not _regular_ guns,” Danny says. Then he grabs the both of them and walks out of the back door into the yard.

“Danny, can I have a run down of what’s going on here?”

“I have no clue,” he says, “but — these are _weird_. Hm, it’s just the two of us here, right?”

“Right.”

“And we can pay back any destroyed property?”

“Sure we can, but —”

Danny raises one of the guns, aiming at one of the trees in the backyard. Then he closes his eyes for one moment as his finger finds the trigger.

Then he shoots.

And _the entire gun turns gold, same as his fist, same as the bullet leaving it as it hits the bark of the tree_ and about cuts a neat hole through _the entire thing_.

A moment later, the second gun in Danny’s hand turns golden, too.

“Holy _shit_ ,” Ward says, staring at his hands.

“Fuck,” Danny echoes, staring at his own hands as they turn back to normal. “ _Fuck_.”

“What was _that_?”

“I — I don’t know,” Danny says, shaking his head, “but — these things, they — they _help_ channeling one’s chi, I think.”

“The _help channeling one’s chi_.”

He nods, then dumps both guns on Ward — at least they don’t burn as he has expected. Then he looks down at his own fingers, curls them into fists and nothing happens, but then he grabs one of them with his left —

And his fist turns gold again.

“Your left _didn’t_ turn gold before,” Ward says, wishing he wasn’t sounding completely ridiculous or stating the obvious.

“No,” Danny says, “but — I don’t know what this means, but — oh. _Oh_. Ward, I — I still have it, I think.”

“You _still have it_.”

“It’s just — I thought Davos took it out of me, but that ritual maybe — I mean, _he_ didn’t fight that dragon and neither did Colleen, so I guess it took the _heart_ of the dragon, but maybe some of Shou Lao’s power stayed with me regardless of whether I have the heart or not? And I couldn’t find it until now but since those guns help channel it maybe something got unstuck.”

“… Danny, I love you, but would you mind using _regular English_? Because I understood shit.”

Danny shakes his head, putting away the gun. “A part of what helped me channel the Iron Fist never left with that ritual except that I couldn’t access it until now, but at the bottom of it I still have it. English enough for you?”

“ _Yes_ , thank you,” Ward exhales, and then — “Wait, so _both_ you and Colleen have the Iron Fist? _How_ does it even work?”

“No idea,” Danny grins, “but I’m not complaining. Shit, _shit_ , I didn’t think — you know what, we should do two things.”

“Okay. As in?”

“Well, tomorrow we need to start tracking down this Orson Randall guy and I need to remember where I heard the name before. But tonight I think we should _absolutely_ celebrate.”

“Fine. What’s the plan?”

“Is eating good Chinese food until we can’t take it anymore good enough for you?”

“You know what,” Ward says, remembering that he hasn’t had anything to eat in a damned long time, “I’m in.”

“Great!” Danny exclaims, his hand going on Ward’s back hard enough to hurt, and Ward can’t help smiling back at him. Fuck, why does the idiot have that effect on _everyone_ he doesn’t know, but — man, he thinks, it’s _nice_ to be around someone that will make you feel good at any given time.

Well, at least this trip started _well_.

——

Five days, a lot of punched goons later and two sunburns (for _him_ , not for Danny, that’s like, completely unfair) later, they have found out that this Randall guy is some kind of mobster that no one’s ever seen but for whom a lot of people work, that he’s _somewhere_ in Kuala Lumpur and that there’s nothing else they can do here.

“Shit,” Ward says as they get back to their apartment, “teaches me to not wear sunscreen.”

“Can I take a look?” Danny asks, and Ward shrugs before taking off his shirt and showing him the back of his neck.

“Shit,” Danny agrees, “that looks bad. Fuck, if I still had the Fist I could —” He starts.

“Danny, I don’t need _magic_ to cure it.”

“Still — wait a moment. Uh, sit down on the bed, I want to try something.”

Danny sits down next to him, puts his palm (warm, _so_ warm) at the back of his head and grasps slightly. “Okay,” he says, “let’s see if I can do this.”

He closes his eyes, breathing in and out, feeling the back of his neck getting warmer, and _warmer_ , but in a pleasant way, and a moment later that burn from before his _gone_.

Danny moves away his hand and Ward’s neck is not hurting anymore.

“What — oh, _wow_ ,” Danny grins, sounding ecstatic, “it worked!”

“It did _what_ ,” Ward says.

“It worked! I mean, it still won’t do exactly what it’s supposed to, but I could channel it enough to heal it — shit, it _really_ never left,” he says, sounding halfway awed and halfway delighted.

“Seems to me like that dragon really liked you.”

“… Sorry?”

Ward shrugs, not exactly knowing how else to put it. “I mean, uh, it went through _two_ other people but somehow it never left you, right?”

“I — I guess not,” Danny admits.

“Right. So if it never did then — I mean, it obviously thinks it should be with you. Or that _you_ should have it. I don’t even know how the hell this works anyway, but like, if you really weren’t the right person to have it then it wouldn’t stick with you now, would it?”

Danny stares at him for a long, long moment, then grins so wide it has to hurt, what the —

“You know,” he says, “that’s the nicest thing I’ve heard in a while that didn’t come from Colleen.”

“I’m sure —”

“It _was_ ,” Danny cuts him. “Thanks,” he says, his voice going quieter. “It’s — I hadn’t expected it to be here still, but —”

“Hey, you _were_ obviously worth of whateverfuckingthing it was. And now I’d need drinks but I don’t really think it’s a good idea, my sponsor would _really_ kill me.”

“Hey, we can just go to the nearest place and get something else, no one _needs_ alcohol to celebrate.”

Ward goes with it and some he doesn’t know _how many glasses_ of sweet plum-flavored tea later, he decides that it’s _not_ that bad an alternative.

——

They take the jet to Kuala Lumpur the next day. Danny looks slightly less down than he was before they left, which is a good thing. He smiles when he looks at his phone, even if not fully.

Ward is one hundred percent sure he’s texting Colleen. He turns on his own phone.

Nothing, of course.

He puts it to the side.

“You all right?” Danny asks the moment he looks at him.

He shrugs. “Sure.”

“You’re not. Let me guess, Joy hasn’t written you, has she?”

“No,” Ward shakes his head. “Not that — I mean, maybe she _shouldn’t_ , because she wasn’t wrong about the two of us not being healthy, but I just — I don’t know what I was expecting.”

“Can I say something completely out of character?” Danny says, putting away the phone and dropping down next to him.

“… Sure.” _Out of character?_

“Leave her be,” Danny says.

“… What?”

“Leave her be. I mean, I understand where she came from and I’m not… really _angry_ , and I still don’t get why Davos would even have felt the need to — never mind. But you were _trying_ and you went through a lot for her, regardless of what she thinks, and if she can’t appreciate the effort, you don’t have to live waiting for her to forgive you. You deserve to get back on your feet and if waiting on her won’t get you there — either she comes back when she’s ready to or she never is, but it shouldn’t stop you from having your life.”

“… Danny, was that a long roundabout way to say _fuck her_?”

“No, of course not!” He says, even if he doesn’t sound too convincing. “But really. You tried. You’re _trying_. It should count for something.”

“It just — I don’t even know why I care that much.”

“Oh, maybe because for a long time she was the only person around you could trust? Please, that was obvious.”

“… Shit, you’d think _you_ went to Narcotics Anonymous, not me.”

“No, I just don’t believe in repressing my feelings.” Danny’s elbow hits his side and Ward doesn’t even think before he lets his head drop on Danny’s shoulder. Danny’s hand is warm when it wraps around his arm.

“Hey,” Danny says, “she’ll come around. If she doesn’t, her loss.”

Ward says nothing but doesn’t move.

If he lets himself be convinced for a while, it can’t hurt.

——

It takes them three weeks of digging around in Kuala Lumpur to come up with slightly more than nothing — Danny takes out an endless list of henchmen using those freaky golden guns, he mostly stands there cheering and paying for new clothes and the hotel rooms, and — it’s _nice_ , he thinks, It’s good to not have to run a corporation at any given moment and to kick back and relax and let Danny handle the bad guys, never mind that he seems to enjoy it now that his chi is half-back or something.

 _Finally_ , some medium-level henchmen talks.

“So?” Ward asks, not having understood _shit_ of what the guy had to say.

“Of course he doesn’t know where his boss is, _but_ apparently the larger fish in this particular pond is in Jakarta, not here. So we need to find _that_ guy and maybe he can give us more information.”

“You remembered where you heard the name?”

“I don’t know,” Danny says. “Thing is, I have a feeling I must have heard it in K’Un-Lun, because it wasn’t _after_ and it certainly wasn’t _before_ , but — it makes no sense.”

“Well, he _did_ send your friend Davos an Iron Fist corpse, didn’t he?”

“Fair, but — well. He’s obviously tied to all of this mess _and_ the guns were definitely his, so — what the hell, finding him is definitely the best bet we have.”

“So, we leaving today?”

“Yeah,” Danny says, “no need to postpone. Has Joy called?”

“No,” he says, “but Bethany might have texted.”

“Who, your sponsor?”

“Yes. I mean, it’s just business talk, but it could be worse.”

“Good,” Danny says, clapping him on the back. “See, by the time we’re back maybe at least one of them will have figured it out.”

Ward _really_ doubts that, but if Danny is that much of an optimism, he’s not going to be the person trying to get him down about it.

Not anymore.

——

Jakarta is a fucking clusterfuck.

Up to the point where it slightly isn’t, in the sense that after a good month of asking around Danny did manage a talk with the top henchman which of course was a trap, and honestly, Ward’s _really_ glad those guns work because otherwise they’d have been fucking outnumbered, but the entire thing turns into him and Danny having to run while Danny covers Ward’s back, except that they have to separate in order to confuse the five people running after them and _of course_ Ward runs right into four people who are _way_ tougher than he is.

Ten minutes later, he’s in front of Top Henchmen guy with a knife to his throat and Danny in front of them with another two henchmen flanking him, and _of course_ they’re talking in Mandarin or _something_ and Ward understands absolutely nothing, but he can see Danny’s panicked face the moment Top Henchman says _something_ , and Ward has a feeling that it’s not good news for him, and those guns were out of bullets when they separated —

Except that Danny’s fingers lock into fists a moment later and he raises his hands and they’re _both_ glowing gold, _what the fuck_ , and he’s knocked out _all_ those people with one single punch, and then he’s on the guy behind him and that knife is not at Ward’s throat anymore.

Danny says something that sounds _fairly fucking menacing_.

The guy replies something else, Danny nods, the golden glow dies down and he punches the guy hard enough to knock him out.

“I should ask what did he say,” Ward whispers, “but I don’t think that’s the point.”

“No,” Danny shakes his head. “He said Randall’s in Japan, but — it’s not.”

“How — is it working properly?”

“Yeah,” Danny says, his fists glowing gold again. “Even _better_ than before. I — _oh_ ,” he says. “I think I got it.”

Now he sounds fucking giddy. _What_?

“You did?”

“Yeah, but — we need to leave. Like, _now_. I’ll tell you on the plane.”

Ward isn’t hearing it twice.

——

“So,” he asks when they’re flying to Tokyo not long later, “what was _that_ about?”

“See,” Danny says, “it was there as you said, but I just couldn’t, you know, make the leap and call it until now. But — well, that guy said they were going to kill you.”

“… Great.”

“Yeah, well, _that_ meant I had to do something, and I tried it again, and it worked, so — I guess I had to get over myself and do it for someone else.” He’s beaming, though, which _makes no sense._

“Get over yourself?”

“Well, I thought I wasn’t — up for it. I mean, that I wasn’t the right person to wield it. Maybe that was the reason why I couldn’t access it anymore. But in that moment it really didn’t matter, and I stopped wondering about whether I deserved it or not.”

Oh. Well — okay then. Ward has no idea of how he has to take this because Danny’s basically told him that he found a way to summon that fist again, _more powerful_ than before, thanks to _him_ or at least _for him_ and he looks… _fairly glad of it_?

“So now —”

“It’s back and it’s _better_ ,” Danny says, “but that doesn’t mean we’re done. I mean, I _need_ to know even more now. And I need to know what’s the deal with those guns.”

“I wasn’t saying we should head back,” Ward says, and then realizes what he’s just implied.

“Oh, really?” Danny’s _smirking_ by now. Ward wants to hate it. He doesn’t.

“Maybe —” He sighs. “Maybe regardless of risking my neck, I’m kind of enjoying this whole business. Maybe.”

“Oh, _maybe._ ”

“Danny —”

“Come on,” he says, “there’s nothing bad about expressing feelings healthily.” He stands up.

“Danny, if that’s some kind of code for —”

“It _is_ , but there’s nothing bad about it _and_ I think you kinda need it _and_ I almost thought they were going to kill you in front of me.” _That_ sounded slightly less chipper than the rest, and — fuck it, he’s right, Ward decides, and he stands up as well and he’s ready for it when Danny hugs him again, _tight_ , and _fuck_ but he’s warmer than before and it’s obvious that he’s entirely relieved, and fuck but he’s glad he came. He really is.

“This stays between us,” Ward admits a moment later, “but I have no idea of what the hell I even did to deserve you.”

“Stop flattering me, people don’t _deserve_ other people. At most they don’t deserve to be treated like shit, but that’s an entire other problem.”

That — that’s a point, Ward decides. He’ll think about it later.

 _Later_.

For now, if Danny’s not moving, neither is he.

——

“I told Colleen about the guns,” Danny tells Ward five days later, as they walk into a clothes shop in Tokyo to get some new ones since theirs are all destroyed and they need to go to Hokkaido and it’s _cold_ in there, or so Danny assures him.

“Did you,” he says. “And what did she say?”

“That it sounded interesting and that she would try to do it with the katanas. And it worked,” he goes on, sounding delighted of that specific development.

“Well, so now you can — both channel that?”

“Seems like it,” Danny says. “Hopefully we’ll find out what Randall’s after in Hokkaido. Hey, how does this look?”

Ward glances at the neon-green coat Danny’s holding up and doesn’t even reply — Danny puts it back the moment Ward looks at it.

“That bad, huh?”

“Danny, you have a lot of good qualities but liking _that_ color isn’t one of them.” He takes a look around, his eyes landing on the opposite rack of coats. Huh. “This,” he says, grabbing one, “would be _immensely_ better.” He hands Danny the long, military-green trench coat he saw hanging there. “And wait a moment.”

He looks at the belts, finds one that could hold those guns and slams it in Danny’s hands, too. “That would work if you need to be warm _and_ hide those guns.”

“Huh,” Danny says, “that — doesn’t look half bad. Wait, I’ll try it on.”

Five minutes later, he comes out of the dressing room with coat and belt hanging on his green shirt and dark trousers and Ward feels envious for a moment that he _does_ pull off the seventies-neo-western-movie look way more than he ever could, but damn, he did pick well.

“So, do I look good?”

“You’d be an idiot if you got the neon green.”

Danny gets a good look at himself in the mirror.

“Yeah,” he decides, “I’m going with it. See, you should let out your inner fashion expert a lot more.”

“The hell —” Ward starts, but he never finishes it because Danny’s gone to the check out already.

And he _still_ needs to find his own clothes, damn it.

——

“So,” he asks, “if Colleen’s taking your calls —”

“She never _didn’t_ take them,” Danny sighs. “I mean, I — I wish I didn’t _have_ to, but after everything that happened, I think I had to do this alone and she deserved to be able to find out what she can do now _without_ me around, you know, but — it’s not like we broke up or anything. She said she’d come if we needed help, but I think we’ve got it for now.”

“Well, as long as I don’t get any more henchmen on me.”

“Oh, don’t worry, I think I’ve got _that_ covered.”

“Ah, so you’re watching my back now?”

“Sure I am. So, when we land in Hokkaido we have at least five places we could go to.”

“I can deal with them for once.”

Danny looks at him, then gives him a firm nod. “Okay, but if it goes wrong just holler and I’ll be there.”

On one side, Ward is kind of grateful that Danny’s not telling him to just shut up and listen even if _Ward_ is the liability who doesn’t have glowing fists or knows kung fu around here, on the other he’s _more_ grateful that he’s basically told him that he’s not — leaving anytime soon, he supposes.

Shit, maybe he should _tell_ him all of that. Maybe. Maybe soon he will be able to.

“Got it,” he says, his hand squeezing Danny’s shoulder through that ridiculous-but-not-really trench.

He doesn’t know if this entire trip is being about figuring out who he could be or about figuring out what he really _wants_ or both, but he knows that Jo’s silence doesn’t hurt half as much as it did when he left and that he’s kind of excited to see where this is going to end up, and he always thought that this whole spiel about finding yourself while leaving everything you knew behind was bullshit, but now he thinks he sees the merit.

“Then they’re all yours,” Danny grins, squeezing his shoulder before they head for the bar.

He also doesn’t know what he means that he’s _excited about this_ , but at this point he’s just rolling with it and he’s glad that Danny’s willing to trust him to _not_ turn this entire deal into shit.

Then again, if it goes like shit, _well_ , he’s not going to have to handle it alone, and that’s — maybe he has to find out everything he really wants from life, but _this_?

This might be some of it. And it doesn’t really feel pathetic to admit it to himself. _Maybe_ he’ll tell Danny after they’re done.

 _Maybe_ he will.

 

 

End.


End file.
